2009 program of studies : nonlinear waves

Abstract:

The fiftieth year of the program was dedicated to Nonlinear Waves, a topic with many
applications in geophysical fluid dynamics. The principal lectures were given jointly by
Roger Grimshaw and Harvey Segur and between them they covered material drawn from
fundamental theory, fluid experiments, asymptotics, and reaching all the way to detailed
applications. These lectures set the scene for the rest of the summer, with subsequent
daily lectures by staff and visitors on a wide range of topics in GFD. It was a challenge
for the fellows and lecturers to provide a consistent set of lecture notes for such a wide-ranging
lecture course, but not least due to the valiant efforts of Pascale Garaud, who
coordinated the write-up and proof-read all the notes, we are very pleased with the final
outcome contained in these pages.
This year’s group of eleven international GFD fellows was as diverse as one could get in
terms of gender, origin, and race, but all were unified in their desire to apply their
fundamental knowledge of fluid dynamics to challenging problems in the real world.
Their projects covered a huge range of physical topics and at the end of the summer each
student presented his or her work in a one-hour lecture. As always, these projects are the
heart of the research and education aspects of our summer study.